Jury Sides With Rapper in Free-Speech Case

"I didn't win, America won," rapper Afroman said Wednesday after a jury ruled in his favor in a lawsuit brought by Ohio deputies he mocked in music videos after they raided his home. "America still has freedom of speech. It's still for the people, by the people," he told WCPO. Testifying Tuesday, the 51-year-old artist defended music videos including "Lemon Pound Cake," which uses home-security footage of Adams County deputies raiding his house in 2022, as protected expression under the First Amendment, NBC News reports. The song makes fun of an officer who appeared very interested in a cake he spotted in the rapper's kitchen. The deputies were demanding a total of $3.9 million in damages.

The seven officers, who filed the lawsuit in 2023, alleged that Afroman's videos and social media posts were an invasion of privacy that caused them "emotional distress, embarrassment, ridicule, loss of reputation and humiliation." No drugs were found in the raid and Afroman, born Joseph Foreman, was never charged. On the stand in an American flag suit, the rapper, best known for "Because I Got High," insisted he had every right to turn the search into art. "After they run around my house with guns, kicked down my door, I got the right to kick a can in my backyard, to use my freedom of speech, turn my bad times into a good time," he said. Any fallout for the deputies, he argued, is "their fault for coming in my house in the first place."

After the lawsuit was filed, the ACLU called it "nothing short of absurd." In his closing statement, David Osborne, Afroman's lawyer, cited NWA's "F--- Tha Police" and Richard Pryor's comedy act, Billboard reports. He said officials can't use the courts to silence critics. "I'm sorry they feel the way they do, but there's a certain amount that you have to take as a public official, it's part of the duties of the job," Osborne said. "What chilling effect does that have on the world we live in? You don't like what a public official does and you make a joke, and you're dragged into court?" The jury sided with Afroman on all counts after hours of deliberations.